


Shift and Rescue

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Paint The Sky With Stars [17]
Category: Night World - Fandom, Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Shapeshifters, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Alternate Universe - Witches, Crossover, Fusion, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-04
Updated: 2016-06-04
Packaged: 2018-07-12 04:07:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7085014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the comment_fic prompt: "Stargate Atlantis, Rodney McKay, his claustrophobia kicks in when he's trapped deep underground."</p><p>Tag to SGA Ep 5x01, some dialogue lifted directly from the episode.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shift and Rescue

Evan’s leg was broken. Even if the pain weren’t blindingly awful, he’d heard the snap of bone beneath the aural chaos of the explosion and the falling rubble. He’d be all right. He just had to breathe through it and wait for the bone to knit. It was his damn tibia, which would take a while because it was a big one, but he’d be all right. No silver anywhere nearby. It’d be okay.

Opposite him, Rodney tapped at his radio. “No signal. Too much interference.”

Evan nodded. “Pretty sure my leg is broken.”

Rodney blinked at him. “I think I’m remarkably fine.”

Evan sighed. “Well isn’t that wonderful. That brings me great comfort. Thank you.”

Rodney peered up. “I don’t know how deep we are. I can’t see daylight. I -” He swallowed hard. “We can’t be that deep. The building fell on us, but we didn’t fall down. Did we?” He reached up, tried to paw some of the rubble aside.

Dust and debris rained down on them, hit Evan in the leg. He let out an involuntary yowl of pain. Super-healing didn’t mean immunity to pain, thanks.

Rodney shrank back. “I’m sorry! I -”

Evan forced himself to take a deep breath. “I posted Edison at the entrance of the building. He’ll get help.”

“Assuming he wasn’t hit by falling debris.”

Evan had forgotten what an eternal optimist Rodney was. “Doc, the Daedalus left Atlantis when we were still confirming Sheppard's story. With that kind of a head start, they should be here in less than -” He calculated mentally - “Three hours. One way or the other, help is on the way.”

“I’m sorry,” Rodney said, and had he actually apologized? “I just - I’m not good at tight spaces.” He fidgeted. Evan could hear how rapid his pulse was. He’d assumed it was from the stress of having just been almost blown up, but now he realized it was something more. Damn.

“Look, there's no bad guys around, okay? No bad guys.” Evan smiled tightly. “Just a lot of debris. So, if you could please just sit tight and try not to make the ceiling collapse, that would be great.”

Rodney nodded. “Okay, no bad guys. Just...just sit tight.” But his heart was still racing and he was sweating and he was headed for a full-blown panic attack.

Damn. “Rodney,” Evan said.

Rodney looked up from where he was fidgeting with pieces of the computer. “Yes?”

“Look, my broken leg will heal in a few hours,” Evan said. Well, it wouldn’t be completely knit, but he could probably shift into True Form and limp around on three legs just fine. “Once I can stand on it, I’m pretty strong. I can see about digging us out, helping whoever is looking for us from up top. We’ll be okay.”

Rodney blinked. “A few hours? Really?”

“You saw how fast I sat up after I got stabbed in the heart last year,” Evan said.

“Oh. Yeah! Yeah. That’s, uh, kind of amazing.” Rodney smiled wanly. He wasn’t comforted in the least.

“Look, can you feel Sheppard?” Evan asked.

“What?”

“You’re soulmates. You’re linked by the silver cord. Can you feel Sheppard?”

Rodney’s gaze went distant for a moment. “Yes. I -”

“Can you go hang out in his mind for a while? A mind feels like a wide open space, right?” Shapeshifters couldn’t see into each other’s minds the way vampires and witches could, not unless they were soulmates connecting.

Rodney nodded, and he slumped back.

Evan relaxed, glad for the silence, for the way the stench of fear pervading the space around them was lessening some. Until it spiked, and Rodney’s pulse with it, and he cried out, “John!”

Evan came to full alert. “What’s wrong with Sheppard?”

Rodney twitched. “He’s - he’s trapped. He’s dying. Ronon - Ronon can’t get the beam off of him. John!”

The debris around them shook.

Evan swore and launched himself across their little cave, swallowing back a scream at the pain in his leg, and shook Rodney, hard.

“Rodney, snap out of it. Come back, dammit! Let Sheppard go.”

But Rodney’s eyes were rolled back in his head and he was getting sucked too deep into Sheppard’s fear and pain. Evan slapped him across the face, hard.

Rodney came back to lucidity, and he was shaking again, pulse speedy and erratic, practically dripping terror from every pore.

“Lorne,” Rodney gasped, grabbing Evan’s arms, “we have to save John, we have to -”

The debris around them shook again, coupled with another spike of terror, and Evan realized. Rodney was doing it. Rodney had the ATA gene from Carson’s therapy. Rodney had magic.

“Rodney, look at me,” Evan said.

Rodney blinked at him dazedly. “What? Why?”

“Listen to me,” Evan said. “I need you to calm down. You have magic, and it’s freaking out because your soulmate is hurt. If you can’t get it under control, everything could collapse on us. You need to calm down.”

But Rodney was shaking apart in his hands, sobbing John’s name over and over again.

Evan made a decision. He stripped out of his tac vest, yanked off his boots even though jostling his leg was agony. And then, because he always wore combat leathers these days, he shifted. For one second he was painless, and then the pain in his leg was back and blazing as bad as ever, but Evan curled close to Rodney, nudged under his hand and licked.

Like a giant house cat.

It was humiliating as hell, but it worked. Rodney began petting Evan’s back compulsively, whispering, “It’s going to be fine. Everything will be fine.”

Evan nudged Rodney’s hand when he stopped petting, and Rodney kept petting, and his heart rate was slowing, his shaking subsided, but he was still crying. Evan let a purr rumble through him, and Rodney actually cracked a smile. Good.

And then Evan heard noise from above.

He hollered to Ronon, hoping Ronon could hear him.

_Help is here!_

And then, blessedly, he recognized Colonel Carter’s voice.

So he threw his head back and roared, and Carter said, “I think that was Major Lorne.”


End file.
